Can I put half of my £60,000 redundancy pay-out into my final salary teachers' pension?

I have been offered a redundancy from my job as a teacher that will be worth around £60,000.

I'm looking to limit my tax liabilities on this amount, so am planning on putting £30,000 into my teacher's pension.

Can I do this and if so, how do I go about it? A.L., via email.

Pension conundrum: Can a teacher recently made redundant put £30,000 into his final salary pension?

Adam Uren, of This is Money, says: Workplace pension schemes in the UK are varied, and things that are permitted in one scheme might not be allowed in another, so it's important that you speak with someone involved in running your pension scheme and see what your options are, and whether they change once you're made redundant.

In your case, you're a member of the teachers' final salary pension scheme, which under its current guise gives you 1/80th of your final salary as income in retirement for every year of service, and lump sum rights that accrue at 3/80ths, or 1/60th for every year for both income and lump sum if you joined after January 1, 2007.

This will change next year when payouts are calculated based on career average earnings, with income and lump sum elements being joined together to accrue at 1/54th of career earnings for every year of service.

As this is a defined benefits scheme - where the payout is calculated based on your salary and service - bumping up the value of the scheme it's not quite as simple as paying in £30,000 as you would with a money purchase pension, where you build up a pension pot that can be used to buy an annuity or drawdown product.

But some final salary schemes do have processes in place where you can buy additional years of final salary income, either through a lump sum payment or by an increase in contributions.

Independent financial adviser Claire Walsh, of Pavilion Financial Services, says: 'Members can normally buy additional year's service in units of £250 of annual pension up to a maximum of £6,000-a-year and purchase can be made as a lump sum.'

Final salary schemes also tend to offer the opportunity for people to pay additional voluntary contributions (AVCs) into a money purchase scheme that can be used to buy an annuity to pay out on top of your final salary income, so if you can't pay the money into the final salary scheme, this could be an option.

If you have neither of those, then you could open a personal pension and save the money into that.

So, there are options for you to do this, you will have to check the ins and outs of the teachers' pension scheme to discover exactly how you go about this.

Claire suggests however, and I tend to agree, that before you do anything you should seek professional advice to discuss the best way forward.

This is a complex process and there are statutory restrictions in place that could complicated things further, such as the annual pension allowance reducing to £40,000 from April which if you breach would mean you could lose tax relief on some of your contributions.